Chapter 37 - The Countess's Fracture
Inside the penthouse suite of the Whitmore Hotel, the atmosphere was thick with tension. A crystal tumbler smashed against the marble fireplace, sending shards of glass and aged Scotch splashing across the hearth.
"Incompetent!" Contessa Beatrice screamed, her voice shrill and stripped of all aristocratic poise. Her silver hair, usually immaculately coiffed, was coming undone at the pins. "You swore to me that the federal injunction would paralyze them! You told me they would be begging on their knees to settle within forty-eight hours!"
Julian Sterling stood near the window, his briefcase open on the glass coffee table, looking thoroughly uncomfortable. "Contessa, the court of public opinion has completely turned. Every major food critic in North America is tweeting about the 'Sidewalk Hearth of Brooklyn.' The Italian Ministry of Culture issued an official press release this morning stating they are reviewing your family's wartime claims. If they open an official inquiry into the 1944 records, we won't just lose the culinary rights—you could face civil forfeiture proceedings in Rome."
"Silence!" Beatrice hissed, clutching her golden cane with white knuckles. "I did not spend fifty years hiding in Switzerland, waiting for Antonio to rot in his grave, just to be humiliated by a girl who bakes biscuits!"
Richard Whitmore slumped into a leather armchair, rubbing his throbbing temples. "We need to pull out, Beatrice. The board of directors held an emergency meeting an hour ago. They voted to remove me as CEO if this scandal continues to tank our stock price. We’re bleeding millions every day this stays on the front page."
Beatrice slowly turned her venomous gaze onto Richard. She walked over to him, her cane tapping methodically on the hardwood floor, until she stood directly over him like a vulture hovering over carrion.
"You soft, cowardly little man," she whispered, leaning down until her face was inches from his. "You think you can back out now? Who do you think financed your father’s failing hotel chain thirty years ago? Every asset your family owns is leveraged against Canossa shell companies in Liechtenstein. If I fall, Richard, I will drag you and your pathetic family name straight into the sewer."
Richard flinched, shrinking back into the cushions. "What... what do you want me to do?"
Beatrice turned toward the panoramic window overlooking the glittering lights of New York. Her eyes narrowed into predatory crescents.
"The girl," Beatrice said quietly. "Lily. She is the engine of that kitchen. Marco has the fire and the bloodline, but Lily has the vision. She is the one who translated Antonio’s notes into something modern. She is the one who found the Vatican documents."
"You want to pay her off?" Sterling asked cautiously. "She won't take money. We already tried that."
"Everyone has a breaking point, Julian," Beatrice sneered. "Lily Rossi isn't an Italian. She has no ancestral ties to that dirt. She is a girl with a family in upstate New York. A younger sister, isn't that right? A sister who just applied for a culinary arts residency in Paris—a program entirely funded by the Canossa Cultural Trust."
Richard looked up, horrified. "Beatrice... you wouldn't."
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"I would burn this entire city to the ground before I let a peasant girl mock me in public," Beatrice said, her voice dropping into a terrifying calm. "Call the Paris foundation. Revoke the scholarship. Have the immigration sponsorship withdrawn. And send a message to Lily: if she does not deliver the original manuscript to my suite by midnight tomorrow, her sister will find herself detained at Charles de Gaulle airport with a forged narcotics charge in her luggage."
***
